3G Microcell - 3G Red Light Flashing

3G Microcell - 3G Red Light Flashing

My GPS, Ethernet, and power light are on with a solid green. My 3G light is a solid red that flashes every three seconds. I use a Netgear router/modem; honestly, I'm not sure what a modem or router looks like but I plugged the microcell's ethernet into the Netgear. I've tried disconnecting then reactivating the microcell. No luck.

Any advice on how to troubleshoot this issue would be awesome. I live in the countryside where cell phone reception is severely limited. Thanks!

Logging in to my account, removing the microcell, and then reactivating it resolved the flashing red light problem (or at least it appears to after 24 hours). I did notice that the progress bar during the reactivation indicated a software update was applied leading me to believe that the sudden red light syndrome is in fact related to a failed update.

Same for me ... Blinking red for a few days. Deactivate / reactivate brought it back to life. Before the deacivate/reactivate cycle, it only let me have 10 numbers allowed on the access point. Now it lets me put 15.

Re: 3G Microcell - 3G Red Light Flashing

Alright, so here's what AT&T told me....after talking to microcell tech support for a while, I was first told that there was an error confirming my GPS location. A few minutes later, I was told that their system had a problem registering the Mcell, and finally, they told me that my M-cell tamper switch had been triggered.

Yes, that's right, they told me that my M-cell, which still had the plastic on the sides, that had never been dropped or modified or anything of that nature, had been tampered with and that there was nothing they can do for me.

So, I chucked the piece of crap into the garbage. My suggestion to everyone, if you have an M-cell with problems, don't deal with AT&T, do yourself a favor and go on ebay and find a 3G amplifier system that will take a cell signal and amplify it and let you enjoy cell reception with no activation and re-activation and red lights to deal with.

If you just purchased your microcell, return it and spend a few extra dollars for the amplifier system.

Thank you AT&T, the peice of garbage device that I HAD to pay for just to get reception crapped out on me and you did absolutely nothing to help me.

Re: 3G Microcell - 3G Red Light Flashing

I agree with overclockedpc. The AT&T guys are useless when it comes to the microcell... not to mention other services.

Here is my situation and this might help. My Service was working fine for over a year, since Sept 2011 till Jun 2012. Originally I could not activate the microcell with my address since was a new neighborhood so I used a close by address and everything was fine.

In June I had a new internet service and I found that they did have my new address so I decided to change it. It required a new activation with the same microcell tower. Bad move... since then I've been dealing with the red 3G light going off almost every day.

I am not sure how much longer I can keep up with this but this issue has to be related to an activation problem... location wise as this is what triggered the issue in my case.

Re: 3G Microcell - 3G Red Light Flashing

I just wanted the forum to know that my experience with AT&T Support was positive. I had the flashing red light shortly after I completed my set-up at home. It was easy to get the light back to steady green for an hour or two. Just pull the plug and restart.

You can also follow the Microcell troubleshooting guide. It may ask you to select your device, and the choice is "other" and "AT&T" and "Microcell. Under "select an Issue", choose the problem you are running into and it will provide step by step troubleshooting.

After two days of the flashing red light, I called AT&T Support. I waited about 10 minutes for a support person (early Sunday morning). I asked her if she knew about the flashing red light problem. She said she did and had proposed solutions depending on the diagnosis. I told her that the AT&T Store had activated the Microcell for me. I didn't return home and complete the rest of the steps for about two hours. She said that was too long of an interval and Support will advise stores not to activate at purchase. She deactivated and reactivated my Microcell for me. Second, her screen indicated that my GPA signal was not locking permanently. She asked how close was my Microcell to a window and were there any obstructions. I was at the margin of the recomended distance to the window (3-4') and the window is at a corner and I am surrounded by lots of trees. I moved the Microcell to almost touch the window and opposite from the corner. Her screen showed the GPS lock problem had disappeared from her screen.

I have been up and running now for more tha 48 hours with a steady green light.

Re: 3G Microcell - 3G Red Light Flashing

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Re: 3G Microcell - 3G Red Light Flashing

Called att support today as the red light was flashing... After troubleshooting they said device was defective and needed to be replaced. They said I had it one year and several months and I would have to buy a new one. I read this topic and hit reset. Thing works fine now.. Bet they were updating it last night. I hate Att support.

ps.. It took me many hours to get the device to work in the beginning. I spent hours on the phone with att support and my phone company. Each blamed the other.. But the phone company tech was awesome (Jake from Fairport)! In the end the Microcell was defective and needed to be replaced. That was a little over a year ago...

Re: 3G Microcell - 3G Red Light Flashing

I'm sorry you had a difficult time with our phone support. If you happen to remember the name or the ID of the person you worked with, please send me a private message with that information.

I am glad that this thread was able to help you resolve the issue though! Our community rocks.

To send a private message, you can either click on the link in this message or click on the little blue envelope in the upper right hand corner, click "compose new message" and type my username in the "Send To" field.

--------------

As of May 1st, I am no longer serving as the Community Manager for AT&T. This account will no longer be able to accept private messages.

Did a post have a solution that worked for you? Help other people find solutions faster by marking posts that helped you as an "Accepted Solution". Learn about accepted solutions here.

I am an AT&T employee and the postings on this site are my own and don’t necessarily represent AT&T’s position, strategies or opinions.

Re: 3G Microcell - 3G Red Light Flashing

"I am disturbed that AT&T is not supporting this product better than this."

I'm disturbed that cell tower coverage in my area has deteriorated over the past several months so that I had to buy this thing in the first place. I've been a cell customer since before AT&T acquired Cingular and never had any trouble using my cell phones from home until this summer.

I'm also disturbed that all this modern technology that's supposed to reduce the need for paper, all has reset buttons that can only be used with a bent paper clip.

Re: 3G Microcell - 3G Red Light Flashing

I too have had cell phones since the days of PacBell (before Cingular). In those days, coverage in our home was perfect. Once the technology started advancing to Edge, 3G, etc, coverage dropped considerably in our home, but the number of Verizon and AT&T towers increased. My guess is that there has been some "give and take" on AT&T and Verizon's part as far as coverage goes so that some towers in certain areas have been "given up" to accomodate either carriers technology (GSM and CDMA respectively). Also, the networks are just getting saturated, and both carriers (AT&T more so than Verizon), are just scrambling to keep up with demand and implementation of newer technologies. The MicroCell was a good idea, and still is, but is poorly implemented in a lot of cases. That's why there are forums like this so that we can one, vent our frustrations, and two, help each other work out issues.

Oh, and the idea of a reset button that has to be used with a paperclip is to prevent accidental resetting because of a surface mount button that could be easily pressed. Very common practice.

Award for Community Excellence 2019 Achiever**The views and opinions expressed on this forum are purely my own. Any product claim, statistic, quote, or other representation about a product or service should be verified with the manufacturer, provider, or party.

Re: 3G Microcell - 3G Red Light Flashing

Try re-registering your location using the ATT Microcell on-line web site. Delete the current location and then re-enter it and select it as the current location. I had the constantly flashing green 3G LED. ATT chat support couldnt fix it so I relocated to a location I have available and the problem resolved when I entered that location.

Re: 3G Microcell - 3G Red Light Flashing

So I have been having the flashing red bar syndrom for a couple of months. I have tried a lot of the suggestions in this forum. The only one that seem to work was to hold the reset button in for 30 seconds and then it would start working again, but, usually for only a day or so. Then I tried deleting my location and re-adding. That worked once, then the Microcell stopped working all together. Worked with 3 or 4 first line ATT support folks, but that was useless as they were basically reading from the Microcell manual. Finally the last one I worked with said she would elevate the issue. but neglected to tell me that it would probably 5 - 7 days before 2nd line support would call me. I got up this morning and figured I would give it another shot troubleshooting myself. I logged on to the ATT website and found that my microcell was no longer even registered. I tried to call ATT Microcell support, but because the device was no longer registered, Microcell support was not an option I could pick. This turned out to be a good thing. I got someone in regular phone support that was good. She re-registered the device and re-added my location, and said she would call me back in 90 minutes. Boom, in 5 or so minutes my Microcell was online. The tech did call me back. She did not know why my device was no longer registered, but she had corrected the situation! So is the holy grail to fixing this problem having your device unregistered and then registered? I have never had it come online in 5 minutes the whole year I have owned it. The jury is still out as to whether this will work day over day, but I am hoping!

Re: 3G Microcell - 3G Red Light Flashing

I'm having the same issue. I have to reset mine sometimes 4 or 5 times a day. The light will stay green for hours, then suddenly start blinking red again. I unplug the power cord on the device, let it sit 5 minutes, then plug it back in. It comes back green for hours again and then goes back to flashing red. I'm with you, it's disturbing, the lack of support for this product. I'm on my second one, as they always seem to tell you it's the device, exchange it for another one. I bet my first one wasn't really defective, because it did the same thing.

Re: 3G Microcell - 3G Red Light Flashing

I'm wondering if your device has a good view of the sky. I had the Red Light syndrome for months, power cycling it at least every other day. I finally moved it right under a window and it has been rock solid for over 4 weeks now!